Well it's Valentine's day in Japan now, and I just wanted to wish you all a happy V-day!

Also, my wife (actually on her own initiative) wrote an article about Valentine's day in Japan.It's actually pretty interesting, as Japanese Valentine's Day is pretty different than the west.

Hope you enjoy!

Here in Japan, Valentine’s Day is as big if not bigger event than in the west! Valentine’s Day in Japan started in the 70’s as a day for women to declare their love to men by giving chocolate What do men do on Valentine’s Day then? In Japan, men just receive chocolate on Valentine’s Day. However, there is another holiday in Japan that you don’t have in the West called “White Day.” White Day is when men who received chocolate on the Valentine’s Day from ladies give something in return to them on the 14th March, one month after Valentine’s Day.

What is the difference between Valentine’s Day of now and then? Women giving chocolate to men hasn’t changed so much, but many kinds of chocolates have shown up nowadays. Also cookies, cakes, and many other presents are sometimes given instead of chocolate.

It's all about the roses in the US too.. And to be honest, it's from the men to the women. Sure there is the odd girl that actually does something for her man, but it's all about the woman in the US>

This year, due to financial difficulty, I made paper roses for my wife and a home made card and sent a free ecard to her as well. The cost of Roses is just too much and when it's a choice of Roses or gas for the car (or food on the table) Roses lose, hands down..

Roman mythology is where we can find the answer. The red rose was said to be the favorite flower of Venus, the Roman goddess of love and beauty.

Even the different colors of the rose have their own significance. For instance, while the traditional red rose symbolizes passion, a yellow rose indicates friendship, a peach-colored rose means a desire to know that person better, while a white rose means true love and devotion. And we all know what black flowers represent, death.

chikara wrote:Fortunately Valentine's Day falls in summer in Australia so I have plenty of roses in the garden

I'm jealous! My roses stopped flowering. Usually they are very hardy, but they aren't handling the dry, hot conditions at the moment. I guess I'd better check what days we are allowed to water the garden and give them a long drink or 2.

For those of you not in South Australia, which would be the majority of you of course, we have rather strict water restrictions here. We can only water the garden 2 nights a week, I think, between the hours of 6-9pm. It might be 3 now, but it's very confusing. We're not allowed to use hoses, except with a trigger nozzle, and can't use sprinklers. It's too sad! On a hot day it's so much fun to run around under the sprinkler or hose.

tokai devotee wrote:I'm jealous! My roses stopped flowering. Usually they are very hardy, but they aren't handling the dry, hot conditions at the moment. I guess I'd better check what days we are allowed to water the garden and give them a long drink or 2. ...

All my roses are on individual drippers and the beds are well mulched. I also have around 2000L of rain water storage and a pump.

What little lawn I have is looking very brown though

tokai devotee wrote:.... For those of you not in South Australia, which would be the majority of you of course, we have rather strict water restrictions here. We can only water the garden 2 nights a week, I think, between the hours of 6-9pm. It might be 3 now, but it's very confusing. .......

They relaxed the restrictions after that rain we had around xmas. You can now water any day of the week but can still only water for 3 hours in total each week.

Don't complain to me that people kick you when you're down. It's your own fault for lying there

chikara wrote:They relaxed the restrictions after that rain we had around xmas. You can now water any day of the week but can still only water for 3 hours in total each week.

Thanks for that, Chikara-san! Crikey! Only 3 hours a week!?! I sure hope the neighbours are not timing me as I think I've probably watered for about twice that already this week, once I noticed the roses were very unhappy and the rest of the garden was beginning to look like the Sahara!!

My girlfriend was in Tokyo during Valentine's Day so we didn't get to spend the day together, but when she came back she had won a ton of Gloomy Bear stuffed bears, and other things from a UFO catcher, which I liked much more than chocolate. But chocolate would have been fine too.